Millish

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Millish has been playing for just two years, mining a vein of Irish music, melting it down, and adding cultures with the zeal of a slightly deranged chef  somehow, in these musicians' capable hands, a classic Irish jig gets paired with the music of Scotland, Brittany, Bulgaria, and Spain, as well as jazz and good old American rock 'n' roll. Purists, please stay home with your record collections; cultural amalgamation is a hard job, but someone's got to do it.

I first saw the band the winter before last at Conor O'Neill's pub on Main Street. A recent ice storm kept percussionist Glenn Bering from attending, but the remaining three  Duncan (on uilleann pipes, bodhran, and a variety of whistles), Saline-bred fiddle whiz Jeremy Kittel, and guitarist Jesse Mason  whipped the corned-beef-and-cabbage-munching crowd to a Celtic frenzy.

I caught them again last December at the Ark. Kittel was off to college, ably replaced by fellow Salinian Brad Phillips, another